


dreaming again of a lonesome world

by earlgreyson



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Auror Harry Potter, Dreamscapes, Established Relationship, Healer Draco Malfoy, M/M, Potions Accident
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-29
Updated: 2020-01-29
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:41:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22102753
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/earlgreyson/pseuds/earlgreyson
Summary: There is a time before the island, he knows, but there is no way to mark the passage of it and before is a thought long lost to the tide. It should bother him more, that he’s lost the thread of what led him to be here. The waves move softly across the sand though and it’s hard to hold onto the feeling with the breeze tugging away anything left ungrounded. He sits on the beach, letting sand fall through lax fingers. The knowledge of how he came to be in this place dances away from him with the grains of sand. He doesn’t know how to catch it again.When Harry is trapped in a dream, it's up to Draco to bring him back.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
Comments: 6
Kudos: 86





	dreaming again of a lonesome world

**Author's Note:**

> I really liked the idea of exploring Harry through the effects of a dream-state and obviously couldn't help but include Draco.
> 
> This was in part inspired by Lonesome Dreams by Lord Huron.

There is a time before the island, he knows, but there is no way to mark the passage of it and _before_ is a thought long lost to the tide. It should bother him more, that he’s lost the thread of what led him to be here. The waves move softly across the sand though and it’s hard to hold onto the feeling with the breeze tugging away anything left ungrounded. He sits on the beach, letting sand fall through lax fingers. The knowledge of how he came to be in this place dances away from him with the grains of sand. He doesn’t know how to catch it again.

There’s no connection to who he is or why he’s here. A voice whispers in the back of his mind, echoes from the depths of his chest, that he's not supposed to be here, that it’s time to leave. But the island is quiet and peaceful and he’s so weary. He decides to explore.

The beach leads back into a salty marsh that he carefully picks his way through. The rustling reeds meet the edge of a forest and he breaks the line. The canopy soaring above him, footsteps muffled in the soft earth beneath. The only noise is the breeze twisting through the trees. There should be more, but what he cannot say. It feels strangely empty. It feels like a blank canvas. He doesn’t know where to begin.

In the corners of his eyes he can see silver glows drifting and swirling amongst the trees. To study them seems impossible, he can’t get close enough before they dissipate. Words he can’t understand drift from the haunting lights and stick somewhere in the deepest reaches of his soul. _Come back._

He doesn’t know how he came to be here though so there’s no way to know where he came from. He finds no trails through the woods. He makes his own with a thought and a twitching motion of his hand.

The world is bathed in an eternal sunset and he loves the way the golden glow sets the leaves aflame. Turns the crown of branches above his head into candles reflecting back at him. There’s a way to describe the way the sun filters down to him, but it slips from his grasp as he reaches for the name and all he can do is shrug it off. If it’s important, it will come back to him.

It’s beautiful. It’s not right. He doesn’t know how to make it better, so he pushes on.

The trees thin out and open up onto a plain, the grass brushes against his knuckles as he walks and he catches sight of pale lines on the back of his hand. Holding it up to the dying light, he can make out the words _I must not tell lies._ He stares at the words for a long time because he knows them, knows they’re part of him, but that it’s not right. As he watches they shimmer and dissolve, rearrange into something new. _I've got you, Harry._

 _Harry._ A word he knows but doesn’t know how. He thinks it’s a name, thinks it’s a word to be called instead of to contain. There’s a shift behind his ribs and a hollow space opens. A quill and ink appear before him and he scratches the name on the back of his other hand. This is something he cannot lose, it’s one of the few things he is sure of in this place. So he takes down the name and returns to looking at the scar on his left hand. It takes a moment of concentration, but he smiles when the words transform.

_I’m waiting._

The sun does not set and he moves on. To his delight he finds that he can manipulate the world around him. He twists the grasses into braids, forms trees from their woven bodies. Clouds waltz across the sky and he animates them into a city in the sky. A small castle of pale sandstone with several round turrets carves itself from a hill. He smiles to look at it and gives it a miniature lake and thistle forest.

He looks at a flower and makes it bloom, collapse into itself, rise again. _Tiger Lily,_ he thinks idly and wonders why he feels sad to see it die. He keeps walking. The ground beneath his feet turns from grass to dusty clay to gravel. He wanders into an old forest. Pines dominate, but here and there a great oak spreads wide branches. He crosses a stream with a giant, swaying willow sitting on the bank. He does not approach it.

He keeps walking.

The specters follow behind, never coming close but flickering in his peripheral. For the most part they remain misty, ephemeral. Occasionally he can make out a form: a hand, the craggy spread of stag horns, the faintest hint of a smirking mouth. Though the shapes do not come near he can hear the sounds they make perfectly. _Come back, come back to me._

But he doesn’t know where the voice is coming from. There’s no way to trace the whisper of words back to the throat that released them. He stretches a hand out towards the ghosts and wants them to reach back. They linger on the edges of his sight though, and they do not approach. A sigh, and he continues on.

The bright light of the sun starts to bother him, doesn’t feel right as it heats his skin. He blinks at the red sun and suddenly it’s the moon. Stars speckle the sky around it and he’s struck by the way the light drains the color from the world, raises the contrast to blackest black and whitest light. Everything is washed in silver and the way it shimmers fills him with a sudden longing. A leaf falls ahead of him and he catches it thoughtlessly, sighs at the way the moon darkens the deep green.

He raises his lips to the wind and calls. He lets his name—as little as he knows, he _knows_ it is his—and his thoughts pour into the breeze and he prays it carries them to somewhere else.

Someone else. He isn’t supposed to be here, but he’s starting to think he might not be alone. The ghosts follow him across the grass, back through the trees. They never approach and they never leave. The world is silent but for the faintest voices at his back and it all feels wrong. It’s beautiful, it’s paradise, and it does not belong to him.

Tall trees give way all of a sudden onto a wide lake and something about it is so painfully nostalgic. Moonlight ripples over the surface as he comes to the edge, steps into the water. The way the stars dance on the little waves reminds him of floating candles and he looks up into the night.

He is not controlling them, but the stars above him twist and turn in sync above him, painting strokes across the blackness. A dog races across the Milky Way, a feather floats along the horizon, a dragon spreads its wings and takes flight.

He watches the dragon in awe. The outline blurred with a thousand twinkling diamond points, it’s stunning. More importantly, the hollowness that still sits in his chest burns less with the sight. It’s familiar in an unknowable way and the vision pulls at something hiding in the core of him. The breeze coming off the lake curls around his shoulders and he feels a ghost brush past. Just the slightest shift of air across the back of his neck, but the cool whispering _Harry, I'm going to bring you home_ is impossible to miss.

There's no misty glow to be seen close by when his head whips around, but something in him he knows that voice. Can't attach a name or face but it sinks into the tense muscles of his chest and he feels a kind of release. He's not supposed to be here, but someone is coming and he's ready to remember.

The stars are beautiful and he's tired of wandering, so he climbs out of the water and lays on the shore. He waves a hand at his clothes and they're dry. It's a familiar motion, but he doesn't try to follow the thought. He watches the swirl of lights across the blank canvas of space, delights at the images that play. The big shaggy dog shifts into a man, back again, into a broom, a swan, a phoenix flares into graceful draconian wings.

_Draco._

The word comes to him as he focuses on the creature. An almost audible click happens when the memory hits of pale blond hair, a wry smirk. A wisp of silver flickers at his side, swirling wildly as it tries to coalesce into a form he can recognize. He extends a hand carefully, gasps when it hits something warm and solid. _I’m coming,_ he hears before it collapses.

Before long he is shivering and frozen. The wind picks up over the lake and bites clean through to his bones. Hair flies in his face as his teeth clack and it feels like a storm is brewing in his chest. The pressure builds, the clouds twist into life above him. Thunder rolls and echoes off the earth under his trembling body. It’s too much, he’s not supposed to be here, he isn’t supposed to be _alone._

_Calm down, Harry, I’ve got you._

The words are more solid in his ears than any have been thus far and he takes a deep breath. Takes another. Tart apples and clean linen tickle at his nose and he _aches._ It’s desperately familiar and comforting, settles in the area near his heart and calms its rapid beat. He knows he should know it, doesn’t know how that is and hates that there’s so much just out of reach. His ribs creak under the pressure.

The landscape shifts around him. Fog whirls in, his head is pounding and he feels like he’s being ripped apart at the basest level. Dirt crunches beneath him as he rolls up to his knees, hunches over. Trees shift into mountains into tsunami waves into burning fields. The world is not right and it’s coming down around his ears.

He doesn’t belong here. He knows there is a time before the island, but he’s lost the track of it and has no idea of how to find it again.

Something warm brushes against his arm and he’s surprised to find his eyes have closed of their own volition. He cracks them and looks in awe at the ghost forming beside him. It struggles—fades into vapour before long limbs solidify—slip free of their bounds and dissipate.

A hand, ethereal and delicate, reaches for him. It's barely there but he _knows_ those long fingers. _Please, Harry._ It's a breath of a sound, barely heard above the pulsing blood in his head. He’s stretching out to meet it before he can think, responding to the plea instinctually. Silvery fingers dust across the back of his hand and for a second they’re tangible. Cool flesh pressing against his own. A wry chuckle tickles at the hairs of his neck, almost inaudible. _Got you._

The ghost disappears, but the touch burns even after it is long gone. He looks down to see _Harry_ still in sharp black ink on the back of his hand. Beneath it, a small starburst flashes a slow rhythm, brighter at the top where he faces into the moon. He turns with an eye on the mark and finds that no matter which way he turns, it points towards the moon.

He doesn’t know where it leads, but he knows he’s not supposed to be here and he knows now that someone is looking for him. Reaching towards the moon, he climbs to his feet and starts to walk.

Trees shimmer and become waves of flowing grass, the grass darkens and becomes seaweed twisting in shallow water. The water goes up in thick snowflakes and comes down as mountains. He’s walking quickly along a narrow path and the mark is flashing faster. The air is laden with the scent of apples and clean linen and he’s running now. He’s not supposed to be here and he’s ready to go home.

The path curves around a sharp bluff and opens up onto rolling moors. A small stream winds its way through the low hills and down the valley there’s a thin trail of smoke. The moon lies hidden behind a peak and the stars are not enough to see in any detail so he looks up and the sun returns. Its early morning glow burnishes the crisp whitewashed walls of the small cottage he can now see clearly to a warm peach. Every inch of his heart screams _home_ as he slips his way along the narrow road, gaining speed as he goes.

He’s close when there's a sharp _crack!_ and the front door opens. Something moves through the entrance. A man—taller than him and rail thin, silken silvery hair cutting across a stormy grey eye—steps out into the sunlight. He's wearing a crisp white button up rolled at the sleeves and dark green trousers and he's seen them before. They both freeze as their gazes lock, and Harry knows he’s been found.

His mouth opens, clicks closed as he struggles to find something to say. The motion breaks the spell holding them in stasis; the other man pelts across the ground and throws his arms wide to pull him into a tight embrace.

 _“Harry,”_ it comes out soft and awed like a prayer. Harry _knows_ that voice in the depths of his being, would know that voice even if he was deaf, blind, and stupid.

“Draco,” he whispers back and pushes him back far enough to take hold of his face. Their eyes meet and the frantic energy that hums beneath has Harry shivering. Draco presses a kiss into his hair, arms wrapping tightly about his shoulders.

“Draco—” his voice is hesitant because he isn’t supposed to be here but he still doesn’t know where _here_ is or how he came to be stuck here. “Draco, I think it’s time to go.”

Draco clutches harder at him and Harry is so _grateful_ he's not alone. Draco can fix this, he can fix anything. Harry knows only three things in this place.

His name is Harry. The man in front of him is Draco. Draco is home.

“I have never agreed with you more. I’ve got you, Harry.” The world around starts to slip from view as Draco holds him like he never intends to let go again.

There’s something warm lined up against Harry’s side as he slowly drifts awake and he turns into it instinctually, pushes his nose against warm skin and inhales. Apples and clean linen. The body shifts.

“Harry? Harry, I need you to look at me,” a voice sounds slightly above him and he whines at the effort it takes, but manages to crack his eyes after a long moment. Draco is propped up on an elbow, other hand resting on Harry's chest, looking down at him with worry and hope. He grins madly when Harry looks up at him.

He’s suddenly crushed in a hug as Draco mutters _“oh thank Merlin, thank you,_ fuck _thank you.”_ Harry is surprised to find how stiff he feels, is even more surprised when Draco releases him enough to see he is not at home, but surrounded by the pale blue walls of St. Mungo’s. His fingers grip of their own accord at Draco’s Healer robes as he tries to think.

As the confusion bleeds into panic Draco drags Harry’s eyes back to him. “What’s the last thing you remember?”

Harry wracks his brain, brow furrowing in concentration.

“I—” It feels like trying to catch the threads of a story he’d heard in passing ages ago. “I was getting ready for work. You had an early meeting with the head of Spell Damage—”

Draco nods. “Yes, I left before you. Can you remember going to work?”

He tries, but can’t and shakes his head as the panic rises. _Why can’t he remember?_ His chin is lifted gently and it brings him back to the moment before he can completely spiral out.

“It’s okay, you got hit with a bad potion combination but you’re okay. I’ve got you, Harry,” he assures, making sure that Harry hears him through his rasping breath.

 _I’ve got you._ The words tug at his head and he frowns.

“What happened?”

Draco doesn’t respond for a long moment, just runs his fingers absently through Harry’s hair as he thinks. The thoughtful expression on his boyfriend’s face is familiar, the fractures of fear trying to hide there though. Harry hasn’t seen that in _years,_ hates to see it there now. Hates even more that it seems to be his fault.

“It was an accident, you were responding to a break-in on Knockturn. There were some unregistered potions and they spilled on you. You’ve been unconscious for almost a week.”

Harry feels his eyes widen as he struggles to think back. Flashes of memory flicker past, but nothing he can get a lock on. He breathes in Draco’s comforting scent. It's like coming home.

Something nudges at the back of his memory so he breathes deeply again, trying to follow the feeling. He hears waves on sand, wind whistling through pine needles.

“There was an island…” It comes out quiet, said more to himself than to Draco, but he gets another nod from the man.

“You fell into a magically reinforced dream-state. One of the potions was designed to provide a place of unrestricted creativity, what better place than in your head? The other was Dreamless Sleep, so it conflicted a bit.”

An understatement to say the least. It goes silent between them, Draco’s fingers still in Harry’s hair and Harry’s gripping tight to Draco’s robes. Something is softly wheeled by his closed door, he can hear tuneless humming accompany the low thrum. Soon the soft touch soothes him and he pushes further into Draco’s space, trying to pull memories from mud. It’s not easy, but slowly it starts to come back.

“I was alone and I could make it do whatever I wanted,” Harry starts, rubs his face against the other man’s chest when he feels it tense. “But I couldn’t remember anything. I knew I wasn’t supposed to be there though.”

“Harry—” Draco interrupts, but stills when the fingers in his robes twist harder.

“I didn’t know my own blasted name, but I knew your voice. You were _everywhere_ , was that you with the stars?" Draco's lips twitch as he exhales.

"It might have been an island, but it was as wide as you could imagine it. And you could manipulate it, but since it was your dream I couldn't. I was wandering around trying to track you for a while." His gaze goes distant for the briefest moment before he tugs Harry even closer. "It was like I could hear echoes of you moving around at first, but when the moon came out I tried to alter the dream and that was the most I could do. I figured it was a good way to try to reach out.

"It must have helped, I was able to feel where you where and I could change more the closer we got. I was on the other side of the mountains when you got to the cottage and I got this sharp pull in my stomach. And then I was there, I could hear you coming up the road—" Draco cuts off as he shoves his face into the black mop of hair. Harry runs his hands along the sharp planes of his back, can't even begin to imagine how all this must have been for Draco.

"You _always_ find me.”

It’s true in every way, in every part of Harry’s heart. It was Draco who found him after the war, it was Draco who tricked him into friendship, and it was Draco who told Harry he didn’t have to stand alone anymore. He couldn’t imagine what his life might be like if Draco hadn’t forced his way in and made himself at home.

Harry pushes at him just enough to kiss gently up the line of his throat, engrains prayers into the soft skin of his lips. There is nothing so much in this world that he is grateful for as he is for the man currently grounding him.

It’s okay, Harry thinks as he chases the taste of _home_ on Draco’s tongue. He’s right where he’s supposed to be.


End file.
